ALL SMALL BUSINESSES ARE CRIMINALS ACCORDING TO THE GOVERNMENT!

Get this, our nasty Senators and Congressmen have now activated a LAW that considers all businesses with less than $5 million in revenue and 20 employees or less to be FIRST considered as financial criminals.

LUCKILY PRESIDENT TRUMP STOPPED THIS FARCE!

On March 21, 2025, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) announced that, consistent with the Department of the Treasury’s March 2, 2025, announcement it was issuing an interim final rule that removes the requirement for U.S. companies and U.S. persons to report beneficial ownership information (BOI) to FinCEN under the Corporate Transparency Act. FinCEN published this interim final rule on March 26, 2025.

In the interim final rule, FinCEN revises the regulatory definition of “reporting company” to mean only those entities that are formed under the law of a foreign country and that have registered to do business in any U.S. State or Tribal jurisdiction by the filing of a document with a secretary of state or similar office (formerly known as “foreign reporting companies”). FinCEN also exempts entities previously known as “domestic reporting companies” from BOI reporting requirements. Thus, through this interim final rule, all entities created in the United States — including those previously known as “domestic reporting companies” — and their beneficial owners will be exempt from the requirement to report BOI to FinCEN.

The law now mandates reporting of the BENEFICIAL OWNERS of ALL companies and businesses operating in the USA FINANCIAL CRIMES ENFORCEMENT NETWORK (FInCEN) or face fines and JAIL!

AS SMALL BUSINESS YOU ARE ALL SUSPECTED CRIMINALS1

Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) issued a final rule implementing the bipartisan Corporate Transparency Act’s (CTA) beneficial ownership information (BOI) reporting provisions. The rule will enhance the ability of FinCEN and other agencies to protect U.S. national security and the U.S. financial system from illicit use and provide essential information to national security, intelligence, and law enforcement agencies; state, local, and Tribal officials; and financial institutions to help prevent drug traffickers, fraudsters, corrupt actors such as oligarchs, and proliferators from laundering or hiding money and other assets in the United States.

Illicit actors frequently use corporate structures such as shell and front companies to obfuscate their identities and launder their ill-gotten gains through the United States. Not only do such acts undermine U.S. national security, they also threaten U.S. economic prosperity: shell and front companies can shield beneficial owners’ identities and allow criminals to illegally access and transact in the U.S. economy, while disadvantaging small U.S. businesses who are playing by the rules. This rule will strengthen the integrity of the U.S. financial system by making it harder for illicit actors to use shell companies to launder their money or hide assets.

Recent geopolitical events have reinforced the point that abuse of corporate entities, including shell or front companies, by illicit actors and corrupt officials presents a direct threat to the U.S. national security and the U.S. and international financial systems. For example, Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 further underscored that Russian elites, state-owned enterprises, and organized crime, as well as Russian government proxies have attempted to use U.S. and non-U.S. shell companies to evade sanctions imposed on Russia. This rule will enhance U.S national security by making it more difficult for criminals to exploit opaque legal structures to launder money, traffic humans and drugs, and commit serious tax fraud and other crimes that harm the American taxpayer.

At the same time, the rule aims to minimize burdens on small businesses and other reporting companies. Millions of businesses are formed in the United States each year. These businesses play an essential and important economic role. In particular, small businesses are a backbone of the U.S. economy, accounting for a large share of U.S. economic activity and driving U.S. innovation and competitiveness. U.S. small businesses also generate millions of jobs, and in 2021, created jobs at the highest rate on record. It is anticipated that it will cost reporting companies with simple management and ownership structures—which FinCEN expects to be the majority of reporting companies—approximately $85 apiece to prepare and submit an initial BOI report. In comparison, the state formation fee for creating a limited liability company (LLC) can cost between $40 and $500, depending on the state.

Beyond the direct benefits to law enforcement and other authorized users, the collection of BOI will help to shed light on criminals who evade taxes, hide their illicit wealth, and defraud employees and customers and hurt honest U.S. businesses through their misuse of shell companies.

The rule describes who must file a BOI report, what information must be reported, and when a report is due. Specifically, the rule requires reporting companies to file reports with FinCEN that identify two categories of individuals: (1) the beneficial owners of the entity; and (2) the company applicants of the entity.

The final rule reflects FinCEN’s careful consideration of detailed public comments received in response to its December 8, 2021 Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on the same topic, and extensive interagency consultations. FinCEN received comments from a broad array of individuals and organizations, including Members of Congress, government officials, groups representing small business interests, corporate transparency advocacy groups, the financial industry and trade associations representing its members, law enforcement representatives, and other interested groups and individuals.

Balancing both benefits and burden, the following are the key elements of the BOI reporting rule:

Reporting Companies

The rule identifies two types of reporting companies: domestic and foreign. A domestic reporting company is a corporation, limited liability company (LLC), or any entity created by the filing of a document with a secretary of state or any similar office under the law of a state or Indian tribe. A foreign reporting company is a corporation, LLC, or other entity formed under the law of a foreign country that is registered to do business in any state or tribal jurisdiction by the filing of a document with a secretary of state or any similar office. Under the rule, and in keeping with the CTA, twenty-three types of entities are exempt from the definition of “reporting company.”
FinCEN expects that these definitions mean that reporting companies will include (subject to the applicability of specific exemptions) limited liability partnerships, limited liability limited partnerships, business trusts, and most limited partnerships, in addition to corporations and LLCs, because such entities are generally created by a filing with a secretary of state or similar office.
Other types of legal entities, including certain trusts, are excluded from the definitions to the extent that they are not created by the filing of a document with a secretary of state or similar office. FinCEN recognizes that in many states the creation of most trusts typically does not involve the filing of such a formation document.

Beneficial Owners

Under the rule, a beneficial owner includes any individual who, directly or indirectly, either (1) exercises substantial control over a reporting company, or (2) owns or controls at least 25 percent of the ownership interests of a reporting company. The rule defines the terms “substantial control” and “ownership interest.” In keeping with the CTA, the rule exempts five types of individuals from the definition of “beneficial owner.”
In defining the contours of who has substantial control, the rule sets forth a range of activities that could constitute substantial control of a reporting company. This list captures anyone who is able to make important decisions on behalf of the entity. FinCEN’s approach is designed to close loopholes that allow corporate structuring that obscures owners or decision-makers. This is crucial to unmasking anonymous shell companies.
The rule provides standards and mechanisms for determining whether an individual owns or controls 25 percent of the ownership interests of a reporting company. Among other things, these standards and mechanisms address how a reporting company should handle a situation in which ownership interests are held in trust.
These definitions have been drafted to account for the various ownership or control structures reporting companies may adopt. However, for reporting companies that have simple organizational structures it should be a straightforward process to identify and report their beneficial owners. FinCEN expects the majority of reporting companies will have simple ownership structures.

Company Applicants

The rule defines a company applicant to be only two persons:
1. the individual who directly files the document that creates the entity, or in the case of a foreign reporting company, the document that first registers the entity to do business in the United States.
2. the individual who is primarily responsible for directing or controlling the filing of the relevant document by another.
The rule, however, does not require reporting companies existing or registered at the time of the effective date of the rule to identify and report on their company applicants. In addition, reporting companies formed or registered after the effective date of the rule also do not need to update company applicant information.

Beneficial Ownership Information Reports

When filing BOI reports with FinCEN, the rule requires a reporting company to identify itself and report four pieces of information about each of its beneficial owners: name, birthdate, address, and a unique identifying number and issuing jurisdiction from an acceptable identification document (and the image of such document). Additionally, the rule requires that reporting companies created after January 1, 2024, provide the four pieces of information and document image for company applicants.
If an individual provides their four pieces of information to FinCEN directly, the individual may obtain a “FinCEN identifier,” which can then be provided to FinCEN on a BOI report in lieu of the required information about the individual.

Timing

The effective date for the rule is January 1, 2024.
Reporting companies created or registered before January 1, 2024 will have one year (until January 1, 2025) to file their initial reports, while reporting companies created or registered after January 1, 2024, will have 30 days after receiving notice of their creation or registration to file their initial reports.
Reporting companies have 30 days to report changes to the information in their previously filed reports and must correct inaccurate information in previously filed reports within 30 days of when the reporting company becomes aware or has reason to know of the inaccuracy of information in earlier reports.

Next Steps

The BOI reporting rule is one of three rulemakings planned to implement the CTA. FinCEN will engage in additional rulemakings to (1) establish rules for who may access BOI, for what purposes, and what safeguards will be required to ensure that the information is secured and protected; and (2) revise FinCEN’s customer due diligence rule following the promulgation of the BOI reporting final rule.
In addition, FinCEN continues to develop the infrastructure to administer these requirements in accordance with the strict security and confidentiality requirements of the CTA, including the information technology system that will be used to store beneficial ownership information: the Beneficial Ownership Secure System (BOSS).
Consistent with its obligations under the Paperwork Reduction Act, FinCEN will publish in the Federal Register for public comment the reporting forms that persons will use to comply with their obligations under the BOI reporting rule. FinCEN will publish these forms well in advance of the effective date of the BOI reporting rule.
FinCEN will develop compliance and guidance documents to assist reporting companies in complying with this rule. Some of these materials will be aimed directly at, and made available to, reporting companies themselves. FinCEN will issue a Small Entity Compliance Guide, pursuant to section 212 of the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act of 1996, in order to inform small entities about their responsibilities under the rule. Other materials will be aimed at a wide range of stakeholders that are likely to receive questions about the rule, such as secretaries of state and similar offices. FinCEN also intends to conduct extensive outreach to all stakeholders, including industry associations as well as secretaries of state and similar offices to ensure the effective implementation of the rule.
THIS RULE HAS BEEN STAYED FOR NOW:

jansen@sterlingcooper.us sent you this article.

Comment:

Benficial owmersip rul

Monday, January 13, 2025

The law aims to curtail the use of anonymous shells and track illicit money.

Ownership-Reporting Law’s Return Sought

Supreme Court is asked to stay an injunction pausing its implementation

The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to rule soon on the national injunction issued by a lower court that paused the implementation of the Corporate Transparency Act, a law requiring companies to disclose their true ownership.

The Justice Department, on behalf of the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, in an application filed on New Year’s Eve asked the Supreme Court to stay the injunction issued by a Texas district judge in early December.

The attorneys representing FinCEN said the government is likely to succeed in defending the constitutionality of the law and that the district court’s injunction was “vastly overbroad,” according to the filing.

The lawyers said the Supreme Court, at a minimum, should narrow the injunction to the plaintiffs in the case.

OBAMA’S PRESIDENTIAL “KLINGON PRISON” IN CHICAGO’S POOREST NEIGHBORHOOD IS A BLIGHT ON THE CITY AND COST $850 MILLION!!!

‘Like a Klingon prison’: inside Barack Obama’s audacious, near-windowless, $850m presidential library

Towering over a low-income area of Chicago, and wrapped in a speech that’s hard to decipher, this controversial monolith feels like a menacing sci-fi HQ. Is it a monument – or a mausoleum?

Lacking a royal family or a state religion, the US presidency has swelled to fill the void, transforming over the decades into a national personality cult, complete with its own secular temples to these powerful men. The latest pharaonic edifice is about to open on Chicago’s south side, where it looms on the skyline as a towering totem to the 44th president, Barack Obama. He might have seemed humble in office, but in his post-presidential, Netflix-producing afterlife, Obama has erected the largest, costliest and most audacious complex of them all. Behold the $850m Obamalisk – or, as it sometimes feels morbidly like, the Obamausoleum.

Previous presidential libraries have taken many forms, reflecting the values of their creators. Franklin D Roosevelt began the tradition in 1940, building a library in Dutch colonial style alongside his grave in upstate New York, which he hoped would be swarmed with “an appalling number of sightseers”. Since then, every president has followed suit in their quest for immortality, dreaming up ever larger museums and archives, conceived as hallowed places of pilgrimage. Lyndon B Johnson commissioned a brutalist hulk for Austin, Texas, a fitting symbol, its architect Gordon Bunshaft remarked, for “an aggressive … big man”. Ronald Reagan opted for a sprawling California hacienda, with a dedicated hangar for Air Force One, while Bill Clinton conjured a cantilevered metallic box in Arkansas – a literal interpretation of his promise to “build a bridge to the 21st century”.

So, how to symbolise hope, justice, equality and all the other bygone values that Obama championed in his meteoric ascent to the White House? How to commemorate the first Black president in history, in whom so much transformational faith was vested, at a time when so many of his achievements are being relentlessly rolled back?

Welcome to Obamaland … a statue of Barack and Michelle. Photograph: Paul Beaty/AP

“We had the idea of a beacon,” says architect Billie Tsien, whose practice, Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects, won the design competition for the Obama Presidential Center in 2016, on the eve of the first Trump presidency. “We thought of four hands coming together,” she adds, holding her cupped hands up against a colleague’s, as if protecting a flame from the wind.

Above us, sheer walls of granite erupt from the ground at a steep angle, before tapering to form a chiselled 70-metre-high monolith. It looks hewn and cleft, towering over the 19-acre campus like a stocky, truncated obelisk. Rising above the low-rise, low-income neighbourhood, the building has an ominous presence, its mostly windowless heft recalling a menacing sci-fi headquarters, with small chamfered openings suggesting portals from where drones might be launched, or lasers fired. Some have compared it to a flak tower, others to a “Klingon prison”. If it is a beacon of hope, it seems to be one that has been fortified at all costs against the present regime, a defensive bunker to protect its fragile values from siege.

“The president was very, very hands on with the design,” says Tsien, with a rueful air. “He talked a lot about his love of Brâncuși.” That’s the Romanian sculptor who was known for his carved, abstract forms. “And he wanted to make things more angular and cut. To make a form, and then try to work out what goes inside it, is really the opposite of how we’ve worked before. It was a very foreign exercise.”

Obama has spoken of wanting to be an architect, before he chose law, and he clearly relished the chance to wield his conceptual chisel. “When you have a client who says that, you get kind of uncomfortable,” admits Tsien. “It usually means they’ve got big opinions, and he definitely had big opinions. But he was a very good critic.” She says the Obama Foundation, which runs the centre, “wanted something ‘iconic’ which isn’t how we’ve worked before. I don’t think you can design something to be iconic.” Her face falls when we encounter 3D-printed plastic models of the building for sale in the gift shop, priced at $40. Still, the client got what it wanted: this memorable menhir won’t be mistaken for anything else on your mantelpiece.

In the reluctant search for an icon, inspiration also came from a rock that Tsien and Williams acquired on a trip to Ethiopia, of a similar faceted shape to the building, with letterforms carved across its surface. Given that Obama was one of the finest presidential orators since Lincoln, it only seemed fitting to wrap the facade with his words. The lines, from his speech commemorating the 50th anniversary of the marches from Selma to Montgomery, now form a sun-shading screen at the top of the tower’s south-west corner. “YOU ARE AMERICA,” you can just about make out, before the words dissolve into an illegible sea of letters. “I don’t know why it’s in Latin,” one confused local resident told me. The lorem ipsum vibes are real.

Memorable menhir … the $40 replicas. Photograph: Oliver Wainwright

The tower is the most visible part of a vast four-building campus, wrought in blocky grey granite volumes, with bronze trimming and concrete interiors, lending the place a rather funereal air. There is a “forum”, housing an auditorium, gift shop, cafe and restaurant (where you can order an Obama burger or Michelle’s family chilli), and a branch of the Chicago Public Library, featuring a presidential reading room of Obama’s favourite books, where you can sit in his favourite Hans Wegner reading chair.

At some points, the Obamamania gets a bit much – there is even an Obama tulip variety in the garden, a gift from the Dutch. Numerous art commissions help to relieve the pervasive greyness, from Mark Bradford’s riotous map of Chicago in the atrium, to Julie Mehretu’s colourful stained glass window, which beams out from the northern facade at night.

The buildings frame a stately granite plaza on one side, while their rears are hunkered into an undulating landscape – designed by Michael Van Valkenburg Associates – that climbs on to their rooftops, including fruit and vegetable planters inspired by Michelle’s garden at the White House. Farther south, past an impressively equipped playground, sledging hill and bowl-shaped great lawn, is Home Court, a shiny aluminium-clad sports pavilion by Moody Nolan, the largest African American owned design firm in the US. It features an indoor NBA-spec basketball court, emblazoned with inspirational Obama-isms, like “Yes we can,” and “No one does big things alone” – a motto the foundation stood by in bringing another architect on board, when Williams and Tsien’s plan got too pricey, with not entirely happy results. The angular metal shed looks like a cheap afterthought, but it will hopefully be a boon for the community.

Obama-isms … the Presidential Center’s interior. Photograph: Oliver Wainwright

It faces on to the sledging hill, which was originally to house a subterranean archive, until it was decided that this would be the first presidential library that wasn’t actually a library. (This may be why its official title is the Obama Presidential Center.) To the concern of some historians, Obama’s is the first entirely digital presidential archive, the centre run not by the National Archives, but by his own private foundation, raising concerns over its objectivity. Where once there would have been stacks, there are now 400 parking spaces (despite Obama’s promotion of public transit, this is still the US).

The physical records might not be on site, but the professed aim to transform the presidential library from a scholarly research centre to a bustling hub of community activity is an admirable ambition. “We didn’t build [the centre] to celebrate my ability to bring about change,” Obama declares in a promotional video. “We did it to unlock yours.” It is not just a library, but a “campus dedicated to supporting future change makers”.

The transformational change, he hopes, will happen inside the enigmatic tower where, for $30 a ticket, visitors are transported through four floors of an immersive, interactive Obama experience – a vertical Obamarama. Designed by Ralph Appelbaum Associates, it is an action-packed romp through the couple’s life story, beginning with the civil rights movements that inspired them, their political campaigns, achievements in office, life in the White House, and how you too can “bring change home” (a motto printed on the gift shop bag).

There is also a full-size recreation of the Oval Office, pre-Trump’s Home Depot gilding, where you can stand in line for a selfie at the Resolute desk. Other highlights include campaign memorabilia, from badges to custom Air Jordans, and doll’s house dioramas of various White House rooms – a particularly poignant inclusion, given the mutilation the building is currently enduring. At the preview days, there were boxes of tissues aplenty.

The ‘sky room’ where you look through Obama’s words. — Elevated viewpoint … the ‘sky room’ where you look through Obama’s words. Photograph: Oliver Wainwright

An elevator finally whisks you past a private presidential suite to the “sky room” at the tower’s summit, where panoramic windows frame the city, beneath a momentous white pyramid-shaped ceiling – the pharaonic chamber at last! It was intended to have a celestial quality, with blue words by artist Idris Khan tumbling from the sky. But, in a major blunder, the pyramid doesn’t culminate in a skylight, but a solid white plasterboard ceiling – perhaps an unintended metaphor for barriers that must still be overcome.

From this elevated eyrie, looking out through the big concrete letters, you get a good sense of how the Obama centre fits into the neighbourhood, and why it has been quite so controversial. Down below stretches Jackson Park, laid out in 1871 by Frederick Law Olmsted, designer of New York’s Central Park, part of which was ceded for the presidential complex. The decision to build on a public park sparked furious lawsuits, but the foundation insists that the project has resulted in more parkland and more trees, thanks to the removal of a road. Still, the symbolic land-grab struck a nerve, when there are so many vacant lots nearby.

MILLENIALS SET TO INHERIT TRILLIONS, THEN WHAT?

Millennials Are Set To Inherit Trillions—but for Most, It Will Come Too Late

An illustration of a home with money coming out of the front door

Realtor.com

The cruelest part of the Great Wealth Transfer may be its timing.

An estimated $124 trillion will pass between generations through 2048. But by then, even the youngest millennials—one of the generations expected to inherit the most—will be 52. The oldest will be 67.

That may be early enough to cushion retirement, but decades too late to really change a person’s financial trajectory.

Recent research from Realtor.com® found that buying a first home by age 30 can compound into a 22.5% higher net worth by age 50 than waiting just 10 years to buy. By 52 or 67, that compounding advantage has closed entirely. Even the youngest Gen Zers will be past this window by 2048.

“An early transfer doesn’t pay one dividend; it changes which financial decisions a family is even able to make for the rest of their lives,” explains Barry E. Janay, principal and owner of The Law Office of Barry E. Janay.

Some families appear to be acting on that reality. A recent survey found that 59% of parents have provided or plan to provide financial assistance to their children, including down payment contributions, cash gifts, and closing-cost help.

And that timing is becoming one of the most consequential divides in today’s economy.

In a stagnant, high-cost era, early family transfers are helping some Americans buy homes, avoid debt, stay employed, and build wealth decades before a traditional inheritance would arrive—deepening the divide between those who receive wealth in time to use it and those who inherit too late.

Early inheritances are helping fill gaps in a stagnant economy

None of this is happening in a vacuum, to be sure. Younger adults are entering prime earning, family-forming, and homebuying years in an economy where many of the basic entry costs of adulthood remain stubbornly high.

The unemployment rate for workers aged 16 to 24 was 9.5% in April 2026, more than double the overall unemployment rate. At the same time, Bank of America found that 42% of Gen Z adults live paycheck to paycheck, while nearly half cite the high cost of living as a top barrier to financial success.

All of that is putting pressure on older generations and their assets.

“There seems to be immense pressure felt by many grandparents who are in the upper middle class in particular to help the younger generations maintain higher standards of living and social access in these various ways,” says Jennifer Kirby, managing partner and co-founder at Talisman Wealth Advisors. “There is a real palpable fear of loss of status after decades of building what they have.”

Writing in a blog post for Bocconi University’s Institute for European Policymaking, Arnstein Aassve, a professor of demography, dubbed this the “King Charles Syndrome”—a reference to the British monarch, who inherited the throne at 73 after spending decades as heir apparent.

The point he makes is about timing: Charles inherited the crown, but not the tenure to shape a reign. Heirs to the Great Wealth Transfer may face a similar problem—they may inherit money, but not the runway to change their lives.

And amid a backdrop of economic anxiety and high costs, that can make all the difference.

“Young adults struggling with housing affordability or precarious employment may see little benefit if inheritance arrives decades too late,” says Aassve. “Families with substantial housing wealth pass on significant assets; those without remain excluded.”

Housing, childcare, and debt show where family money is already propping things up

Aassve’s timing problem is already visible in the housing market, and that could spell trouble for the economy overall.

“Inter vivos transfers, so to speak, have always been going on, but they can’t be what keeps first-time homeownership afloat,” says Jake Krimmel, senior economist at Realtor.com. “That’s not healthy or sustainable for the housing market or the broader economy.”

Multi-line graph showing Millennial and Gen Z homeownership Lags behind older generations

His point is that homeownership is not only a private milestone. It’s also one of the country’s biggest engines of middle-class wealth, and residential real estate has historically accounted for 15% to 18% of gross domestic product, according to the National Association of Home Builders.

But housing builds wealth only when people can get in early enough for the benefits to compound.

“It certainly feels like there’s a K-shaped economy when it comes to younger families,” Krimmel says, pointing to the contrast between first-time buyers who purchased before or during the COVID-19 pandemic and those who have spent the past four years on the sidelines, “locked out of homeownership in the midst of their prime earning years.”

He’s referring to a trend in which growth splits in two directions, with some households, businesses, or sectors continuing to gain ground while others fall further behind.

Family money can widen that split. A 2026 Journal of Financial Economics study found that parental co-signing can relax borrowing constraints, allowing first-time buyers to qualify for larger mortgages, buy more expensive homes, and enter the market earlier.

Graphic illustrating that buying a home by age 32 nets 22.5% higher net worth by age 50 — Buyers who purchase early accumulate a higher net worth in middle age, our Generational Wealth study has found.Realtor.com

But housing is only the most visible example. The same dynamic is showing up in childcare, education, and debt.

Kirby says she sees parents helping adult children with down payments, home expansions, childcare costs, subsidized rent, direct distributions, and education—often to help them avoid debt.

But childcare, she says, may be the clearest example after housing because it allows parents to keep working, earning, and saving. In some cases, grandparents are contributing “upward of $40,000 to $60,000 a year” to help cover those costs, she says.

The payoff may compound for decades

That kind of support may not look like a traditional inheritance, but it can function like one—or even better than one if it arrives at the right time.

Homeowners are 1.3 times more likely than renters to expect to leave assets to the next generation, and children raised in homeowner households are 18.4 percentage points more likely to become homeowners by age 35.

That is how timing becomes an inheritance in its own right. A late inheritance still matters, to be sure. But it may not restore the years when family money could have helped someone buy earlier, borrow less, keep working, save more, or build equity while those gains still had time to multiply.

The Great Wealth Transfer is still coming, but the transfer shaping American life is already underway.

MORONS, LOSERS AND WEIRDOS CROWD THE DEMOCRATIC CONTENDERS FOR PRESIDENT…DO WE WANT ANY OF THEM ?

Democratic presidential field?

No candidate has jumped in, but governors, senators and former contenders are already shaping the race.

Democrats’ 2028 field is sprawling and unsettled. (The Washington Post)

Analysis by Amber Phillips

The 2028 Democratic presidential primary has no candidates, no front-runner and no obvious lane.

That hasn’t stopped the shadow campaign from beginning.

There is a sprawling, unsettled field that include former presidential candidates, governors, senators, House members and celebrities.

“There is a good amount of talent and interesting candidates out there right now,” said one top Democratic strategist, granted anonymity to speak freely about party leaders.

Here’s how the field is shaping up. (This is our third ranking so far. Our most recent ranking of potential Republican candidates is here.)

The standouts

Sen. Mark Kelly’s (D-Arizona) stock is rising, this early out. (Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post)

Mark Kelly: The Arizona senator said he’d “seriously consider” running for president earlier this year after a judge blocked the Trump administration from punishing him over a video reminding service members they do not have to obey illegal orders. Kelly is a former astronaut (at a time when astronauts are cool again) and an astronomical fundraiser from a swing state whose wife, former congresswoman Gabby Giffords, was severely injured in a shooting more than a decade ago.

He has yet to be tested on the national stage; Vice President Kamala Harris considered Kelly for her running mate but didn’t ultimately choose him. “We’re in some seriously challenging times,” he told the BBC earlier this year.

Gavin Newsom: California’s Democratic governor is constantly online mocking President Donald Trump and has had some wins against the president too. He led a successful push to redraw California’s congressional map to counter Republicans’ redistricting effort.

He has a new book out and said he hopes to reshape his brand from a slick, liberal governor and cast himself as more of an everyday man. “I’ve become a caricature of myself and contributed to it,” he told the Atlantic earlier this year.

Josh Shapiro: The popular Pennsylvania governor is lesser known nationally but could have a big year. He’s up for re-election and is trying to help Democrats take back control of the House by helping his party win four of the most competitive races in the nation, which are in Pennsylvania.

“I think the best way to begin to climb out of this,” he said after the Supreme Court weakened the Voting Rights Act, “is by changing the makeup of the Congress, ultimately then changing the makeup of who occupies the White House and beginning to pass some laws that actually respect all Americans instead of trying to tear down certain ones.”

Shapiro champions liberal causes and is on board with making the midterms about Trump. He also sometimes criticizes the most liberal wing of the party, especially on issues relating to Israel. (Shapiro is Jewish and talks extensively about his faith.) Utah’s conservative, Republican governor said Shapiro would make a good president.

The middle of the pack

Audience members watch the Rev. Al Sharpton talk with Kamala Harris in April. (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

Kamala Harris: The former vice president and presidential nominee has kept on the road with a book tour about her shot-out-of-a-cannon presidential campaign and was warmly received at an event this spring in New York City hosted by the Rev. Al Sharpton, to cheers of “Run again!” An NBC poll in February found Harris as the most well-liked among potential 2028 contenders, and she’s known as a good debater. But Democratic insiders don’t see her as a viable candidate, given she lost to Trump.

Pete Buttigieg: President Joe Biden’s transportation secretary is naturally talented: He’s frequently cited by Democrats as one of the party’s best messengers, a veteran and at 44 is one of the youngest potential candidates. But he hasn’t held office in years and thus doesn’t have a natural platform to communicate with voters. At Sharpton’s gathering this spring, Buttigieg accused the Trump administration of a “seek and destroy” effort to harm disadvantaged communities.

Gretchen Whitmer: The governor of Michigan is one of the few women on this list. Her overall popularity, ability to communicate plainly and perch from a swing state have long made her an attractive candidate. But this year marks her final and second term as governor, and she’s repeatedly indicated she’s not interested in running. Last week, Whitmer said she wasn’t running for president despite being considered a top potential candidate, then hours later walked that back: “Never say never,” she said.

RICH SNOWFLAKES IN PALM BEACH COMPLAIN ABOUT HE TRUMP NOISE…OH I FEEL SO BAD FOR THEM..

Trump cleared the skies above Mar-a-Lago. His rich neighbors paid the price

Palm Beach residents suffer sleepless nights after US president diverted flight paths from luxury club

It was 6.05am in October last year when Sterling Hamill was awoken by the unmistakable screech of a plane flying low over his home.

The 86-year-old retired businessman had moved 11 years earlier from a home near Mar-a-Lago, Donald Trump’s luxury club in Palm Beach, Florida, to avoid the noise of aircraft.

At first, Mr Hamill dismissed the shuddering vibrations as a one-off.

Mr Trump has spent around a month at Mar-a-Lago, known as the Winter White House, each year since he made the Florida resort his official residence in 2019.

It is everyone’s business when the president is in town: roads in Palm Beach close, the highway is cut off, and the occasional helicopter skirts across the island to deliver the president to the club.

But then another plane flew over Mr Hamill’s house. And then another. Over the course of the day, aircraft flew over the property every three minutes.

And then reality dawned.

An aerial view of President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida — Mar-a-Lago became Donald Trump’s official residence in 2019 Credit: Steve Helber/AP

“Trump has spent 30 years trying to change the flight path [over Mar-a-Lago], and now he’s succeeded,” Mr Hamill told The Telegraph from his home on El Brillo Way, an exclusive road in Palm Beach that once counted Jeffrey Epstein among its inhabitants.

“I bought this property because the one I had before was close to Mar-a-Lago, and the aircraft noise bothered me. Now it’s come home to roost.”

A busy flight path that scores the airspace to and from Palm Beach International Airport – soon to be renamed the President Donald J Trump International Airport – had blighted Mr Trump’s resort since he bought it on the cheap in 1985.

Property deeds show Mr Trump paid around $5m (£3.76m) for the 17-acre estate that hugs a roadside between the Lake Worth Lagoon and the Atlantic Ocean. It was a snip. The initial asking price was $20m.

Residents claim Mr Trump bought the property so cheaply because of the huge costs for the upkeep of the property, which was built in the 1920s for a cereal heiress, as well as the deafening flights overhead. Subsequent litigation suggests they were right.

President Donald Trump speaks to reporters at Mar-a-Lago, his residence in Palm Beach, Florida — Donald Trump sued Palm Beach County because of aircraft noise over Mar-a-Lago in 2015 Credit: Al Drago/Getty Images

Mr Trump has sued Palm Beach County three times in as many decades to try to change the flight path.

Mr Hamill is one of many wealthy Palm Beach residents who believe that Mr Trump has used his presidential powers to make his wish come true.

In October 2025, the Secret Service announced it was rerouting all flights to avoid the airspace above Mar-a-Lago for “national security reasons” for a year.

Instead, the 200 or so flights a day now jerk northwards before they hit Mar-a-Lago to carve the skies above the residences of Palm Beach, where property prices can reach up to $150m, as well as the nearby neighbourhoods of West Palm Beach and Flamingo Park.

For retirees like Mr Hamill, a former partner in the international yacht brokers Camper & Nicholson, it means the breezy corner of Florida is no longer the oasis he once knew.

“I first came to Palm Beach in ‘62, I couldn’t believe it. I said, ‘This is the world-famous Palm Beach.’

“You know, we crossed the bridge. It’s a bit like going into Harrods, where it says, ‘Enter a different world’,” he said from his interior courtyard, which is dotted with jungle plants and statues.

When The Telegraph visited on May 21, 14 flights flew over his house in a 90-minute period. Several were so loud that Mr Hamill’s voice was barely audible.

Residents have come to refer to the phenomenon as the “Palm Beach Pause” because they are forced to suspend their conversations while aeroplanes pass overhead.

Some flights continue until 2am or 3am, and the wealthy residents have said it has led to sleepless nights, damage to their property and an overall erosion of the opulence and relaxation Palm Beach is known for.

“We spend more time inside now. You can’t entertain. I mean, you could not have a dinner party … but that’s not why people retire to Palm Beach,” said Mr Hamill. “The sense of peace, tranquillity. It’s gone.”

In December, Palm Beach County filed a lawsuit against the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), which controls US air travel, arguing that its decision to reroute flights to avoid Mar-a-Lago was arbitrary and capricious.

Local politicians believe their case was strengthened as Mar-a-Lago shuttered for the season in early May, and yet the new flight path remained.

Gregg Weiss, a Palm Beach County commissioner, told The Telegraph: “While everyone understands that we need to protect the president when he is in residence, we do not think it is fair to keep TFRs [temporary flight restrictions] in place when the president is out of town.”

Residents have launched their own grassroots push to fight back against the changes.

Palm Beach, an exclusive 18-mile barrier island where the median age is 70, is home to some of the world’s richest people, including many athletes and movie stars.

‘I’m known as the anti-aeroplane noise woman’

Alexandra Kauka, 86, an Austrian publishing tycoon and Mr Hamill’s wife, has been posting hundreds of leaflets in the neighbourhood about the disruption over the past few weeks.

“I’m known as the anti-aeroplane noise woman. Normally, I don’t open my mouth so wide because I feel there are other people here, old Palm Beachers who should do something,” she told The Telegraph while sipping a glass of low-calorie sparkling rosé.

“In our case, we bought a tranquil, beautiful, wild place where we can live happily for the rest of our lives.

“And this tranquil idea is now completely disturbed and ruined. And we don’t really understand why.”

Sterling Hamill and Alexandra Kauka at their home in Palm Beach — Sterling Hamill and Alexandra Kauka have been disturbed by the new flight path since October last year Credit: Poppy Wood

Ms Kauka questions the motives behind the flight redirections, given the security standards at Mar-a-Lago. She claims that her bag was not screened before attending a dinner at the Palm Beach resort last year when Mr Trump was sitting in the same room.

“How can you fear for your life and then live your life in a club? A club with members who bring their guests?” she said.

The president has yet to explain the specific risks that aircraft flying over his estate would pose, although the Secret Service said earlier in May that “the current threat level is heightened based on global affairs”. Residents have read this to mean a potential plane hijacking.

In response to questions from The Telegraph, the Secret Service said it was “not accurate that the president requested the TFR – it was actually the Secret Service”.

“Similar to security measures routinely implemented around the White House, the Palm Beach area remains closely associated with the office of the president and is therefore considered a potential target for individuals or groups seeking to conduct acts against the federal government or the United States,” the federal agency said.

The Telegraph has also contacted the White House for comment, but no response was forthcoming.

‘Our lives have been damaged badly’

One Palm Beach millionaire who spoke on the condition of anonymity fears “the security card” will be used to extend the flight ban beyond Mr Trump’s term in office.

“It’s the notion that he’s really abusing this to essentially get a permanent ban. So after he leaves the presidency, we’re stuck with a situation where all our property prices have been devalued [and] our lives have been damaged badly,” he said.

The Palm Beach resident, who bought his waterfront house for an eight-figure sum several years ago, claimed that he would not have purchased the property had he known there would be excessive flight noise.

The aggrieved homeowners have not ruled out teaming up to pursue an “inverse condemnation” claim – a legal remedy used to force the government to pay compensation when it unfairly damages private property.

Real estate agents who attended a recent meeting to discuss the airport noise said they had predicted local property prices could be hit by at least 20 per cent if the flight changes were made permanent.

For an area where house prices easily hit the tens of millions, that could quickly escalate to a $1bn legal claim for damages.

Such legal pursuits would be ironic, since Mr Trump tried to use an inverse condemnation claim when he sued Palm Beach County for $100m over the airport noise in 2015.

An aerial view of the Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida, and the Atlantic Ocean — Donald Trump purchased the Mar-a-Lago estate in 1985 Credit: Slim Aarons

Court documents obtained by The Telegraph show that lawyers for Mr Trump claimed the “overflights constitute a continuing, direct and substantial physical invasion of Mar-a-Lago and an interference with the beneficial use, quiet, and enjoyment of the property”.

The lawsuit also claimed the flight disturbances were destroying a “once serene and tranquil ambience” of the property and directly cited the “substantial diminution and decrease in the market value of Mar-a-Lago” in its pursuit of damages. Mr Trump abandoned the claim when he entered the Oval Office the following year.

The current value of Mar-a-Lago is merely a subject of speculation as there seems to be no prospect that Mr Trump would sell it. The US president, known for his hyperbole, has previously said that its standing as the “Mona Lisa” of properties had made it deserving of a $1bn price tag.

He was later accused of inflating that figure to secure favourable loans on the property – a claim he vehemently denied.

‘It’s about fairness’

For some wealthy Palm Beach residents, the flight noise is just another property deal for Mr Trump.

One local millionaire, who also asked not to be named, told The Telegraph: “We all know he’s a developer. He’s quite proud of the fact that he’s a developer. And what do developers do? They increase the value of things for future sale.”

The man claims he has had sleepless nights since the flight reroutes came into effect without warning in October 2025. To counter the noise, he has installed foam insulation on all the bedroom windows at his home in the exclusive area near Royal Palm Way, which has been in his family for several generations.

“I’ve spent a significant amount of money soundproofing the house. But that comes with a cost – the children’s bedrooms, my bedroom: they’re pitch black,” he said.

A Palm Beach resident boarded up a bedroom window to attempt to block out the noise from rerouted aircraft

“The predominant feeling is anger. The biggest thing to note is that we don’t want this to be some type of political persecution of Donald Trump. That’s not what this is. It’s about due process, it’s about property values. It’s kind of about fairness.”

He may still be willing to join an inverse condemnation claim against Mr Trump, he told The Telegraph. The only snag? It would require each resident participating in the claim to make their identities public.

While Florida has been a solidly Republican state in presidential elections since 2016, Palm Beach County is still one of the few districts that voted Democrat in 2024.

The Democrats also flipped the seat in a special election in March to install Emily Gregory in the state’s House of Representatives.

‘My phone doesn’t stop ringing with complaints’

Many residents told The Telegraph they had clients and business partners who were too scared to cross the US president.

Marty Klein, 78, a former lawyer for Mr Trump who now sits on the Citizens’ Committee on Airport Noise in Palm Beach, estimates the number of furious residents in the wider Mar-a-Lago area to be about 25,000. Few of them were prepared to speak on the record yet, he said.

“People have never had noise, and all of a sudden they have noise … My phone doesn’t stop ringing with complaints,” he told The Telegraph while sipping an iced coffee at The Breakers hotel.

Palm Beach Marty Klein, who sits on the Citizens Committee on Airport Noise in Palm Beach, at the Breakers hotel — Palm Beach resident Marty Klein, who sits on the Citizens Committee on Airport Noise in Palm Beach, at the Breakers hotel Credit: Poppy Wood

The committee has organised a series of emergency meetings about the flight redirections, which have been well attended. But Mr Klein is pessimistic about whether the lawsuit will achieve anything.

“I don’t have much hope, because even if they reconsider, I’m sure the Secret Service is going to come back and say it’s a question of security,” he said. “Noise is like a balloon. You squeeze it, it comes out somewhere.”

On Worth Avenue, a strip of luxury stores where models parade up and down as walking adverts for clothes shops, the political fault lines of the topic quickly become clear.

While walking Smudge, her black Labrador, Theresa Rassas, a 74-year-old resident, said the flights were a necessary price to pay to ensure Mr Trump’s security – especially given the three recent assassination attempts.

“I’m for President Trump. My son worked for President Trump, so I’m all for what has to be done to keep him safe. I know a lot of people don’t like it. I was in one restaurant one night, and it sounded like the plane was landing in the restaurant, but I knew what it was,” she said.

A high-end shopping area on Worth Avenue, in Palm Beach, Florida Credit: Poppy Wood

For some of the long-established store owners on the elegant Worth Avenue, the noise is an unwanted reminder of how much Mr Trump has put Palm Beach on the map and encouraged a new clientele to the neighbourhood.

And, unlike many more recent arrivals, they are willing to speak out.

“This has never been a resort place where people came to, you know? It was just where people had their homes. But now there’s sightseers,” said Tatiana Van Zandt, 76, who runs the Trillion clothing store with her husband.

“We’re ashamed that we have him as a president. I’m always apologising to our Canadian customers. We’ve been here 42 years. It’s really a small, elegant community, and unfortunately, he’s added an element that is not elegant.”

Others are resigned to the jet noise. “You can’t sit outside anymore when the planes go overhead,” says Ed Kassatly, 92, who has run his family’s silk and linen business on Worth Avenue alongside his brother since 1956. “No one likes it.”

Ed Kassatly, who has run a family silk and linen business on Worth Avenue in Palm Beach since 1956 — Ed Kassatly has run a family silk and linen business on Worth Avenue in Palm Beach since 1956 Credit: Poppy Wood

The lack of a unified backlash has forced some of the wealthiest Palm Beach residents to take matters into their own hands.

Disheartened at a lack of strong data on the impact of the flights, one millionaire whom The Telegraph spoke to has bought a fleet of special microphones and installed them in homes throughout the neighbourhood.

The financier taught himself to code to create a complex website tracking the flight path noise, which he hopes to present as part of the lawsuit.

From the bright office in his waterfront home, he traced a series of dots blinking from green to orange to deep red as flights flew overhead.

Anything above 65 decibels is considered dangerous to the human ear – a fact pointed out in Mr Trump’s own 2015 lawsuit against Palm Beach County.

But until the authorities take notice of his data, a tug of war remains to take back the quiet that retired residents had paid for.

“Frankly, I want peace and quiet,” said Mr Klein, whose own house near the Breakers hotel sits under the flight path.

“I went to see Santa Claus at Christmas time and he said, ‘What do you want?’ He thought I was going to ask for either a boat or a plane or a trophy wife.

“And when I saw him, I said, ‘I want peace and quiet.’ And he said, ‘No chance.’ I said, ‘I need a new Santa Claus.’”

WHO ARE HE OWNERS OF PRIVATE YACHTS AND AIRPLANES???

The Average Net Worth Of People Who Own A Private Yacht

If you reach a wealth threshold that officially places you in the top 1%, it’s safe to say that your life is fundamentally different than most people. After all, having an abundance of money can allow you access to a multitude of luxury items and experiences that the average person may never come across — from luxury clothing brands to expensive cars, mansions, and even jewelry. However, one purchase in particular tends to be more common among the ultra rich: private luxury yachts.

That said, it’s obvious that a private yacht is far from cheap, both to initially purchase and to maintain — not to mention staff with a crew. This might leave you wondering exactly how much someone has to be worth in order to afford such an ongoing expense. If you thought the average net worth of people who own a private jet was outrageous, you could be surprised to learn that it pales in comparison to the average net worth of luxury yacht owners. According to research by the Institute for Policy Studies, the median net worth of private jet owners was between $140 million and $190 million in 2023. However, according to Barron’s, the average net worth of those that owned a private luxury yacht in 2020 was around $510 million.

How much does a private yacht cost?

The Average Net Worth Of People Who Own A Private Yacht

A general rule of thumb for yacht costs is that the annual maintenance expenses are around 10% of the price you initially purchased it for. Now according to Galati Yacht Sales, the average price of a yacht sold in 2023 was around $1.5 million dollars for those between 56 and 79 feet. However, with so many different shapes and sizes, the actual price of a yacht can vary considerably depending on what you’re looking for.

For example, a small yacht, which on average is under 40 feet in length, can start at $350,000 and go up to as much as $2.5 million dollars. The next step up would be a mid-sized yacht, which are between 40 and 70 feet. These typically cost between $2 million and $6 million. Now, for those trying to cruise the ocean in ultimate luxury, large yachts are typically between 70 and 90 feet in length, and generally priced between $6 and $15 million — but can even be more expensive with added features. A super yacht, which is larger than 90 feet, starts at a minimum of $10 million but can exceed $100 million for bigger, more luxurious models with high-end amenities. Last but not least, mega yachts, which exceed 165 feet in length, cost around $600 million dollars.

Considerations when buying a yacht

The Average Net Worth Of People Who Own A Private Yacht

The first step in the process of buying a yacht is finding a reliable broker, and then selecting the type of yacht that appeals to you. There is a large variety of different sizes of yachts available across various price ranges. While you can choose to buy one either new or used, selecting one that is right for you will largely depend on how much money you have to spend, as well as your personal preferences when it comes to customization. For example, if you want your yacht to have amenities like a pool or additional sleeping quarters, these will cost extra. However, it’s important to consider these options before purchasing.

Now unless you have enough liquid cash, you’re likely going to have to take out a loan in order to begin the process of actually purchasing your luxury yacht. If you have a debt-to-income ratio of below 40%, it will be no problem qualifying for this. Beyond the loan itself, you will also need enough liquid cash for a 10% down payment, and have enough money to be able to securely pay an additional 5% APR on your yacht for the next decade — or until the loan is entirely paid off.

UKRAINE’S DRONES ARE ACTUALLY DESTROYING THE RUSSIAN OIL INCOME

Drones© Switchblade Drone. Image Credit: Industry Handout.

Summary and Key Points: Ukrainian long-range drones have struck 24 of Russia’s 33 major oil refineries since 2022, knocking out roughly a quarter of national fuel production and a third of gasoline output.

-Total damage to Russian oil infrastructure now exceeds $13 billion.

Ukraine Switchblade Drone. Image Credit: Creative Commons.© Ukraine Switchblade Drone. Image Credit: Creative Commons.

-Ukraine has also destroyed up to 300 Russian air defense units a month, opening the way for deeper strikes — including a 600-drone assault on Moscow in mid-May and a first-time airport closure in Kaliningrad.

Ukraine Is Making Russia’s Oil Industries Pay

Ukraine’s escalating long-range drone and missile strikes have increasingly crippled Russia’s economic and logistical foundations.

Kyiv has systematically targeted Russia’s oil infrastructure, supply chains, and military-industrial sites.

Ukrainian long-range drone strikes have disabled nearly all processing facilities in Central Russia, knocking out 25 percent of the country’s fuel production capacity.

With nearly a third of gasoline and a quarter of diesel output impacted, the strikes aim to cripple Moscow’s war economy and restrict battlefield logistics.

This is changing the entire outlook of the war, as the tide has turned toward a possible Ukrainian victory.

S-70 Drone VIA X Screenshot. Image Credit: X Screenshot.© S-70 Drone VIA X Screenshot. Image Credit: X Screenshot.

Ukrainian Drones Have Hit 24 Of Russia’s Major Oil Refineries

Since the Russians invaded Ukraine in February 2022, the Ukrainians have conducted at least 158 strikes against Russian oil refineries. And those strikes have been conducted against 24 of 33 major Russian refineries.

Those attacks have intensified in the past year. Up to this point in 2026, Ukrainian drone strikes against oil facilities have already surpassed all of 2024.

Evgeny Borovikov, deputy CEO of the Russian insurance broker Mains, said that direct damage to oil and gas infrastructure from drone attacks exceeded 100 billion rubles (around $1.1 billion).

He added that when other economic effects are taken into account—including lost production and secondary disruptions—the total impact rises above 1 trillion rubles (approximately $13 billion).

Lancet Drone. Image Credit: Russian State Media.© Lancet Drone. Image Credit: Russian State Media.

Lancet Drone from Russia. Image Credit: Creative Commons.© Lancet Drone from Russia. Image Credit: Creative Commons.

Russia’s economy relies on oil and gas taxes for 25 percent of its budget. It is already stretched tight, and this loss of revenue will stretch it to the breaking point.

Ukrainian drone attacks continue to target Moscow’s oil production facilities, effectively shutting down the Syzran Oil Refinery, which refines about 170,000 barrels a day. Six of Russia’s ten oil refineries were forced to shut down production, at least for a short time.

Western Economic Warfare Targets Russian Oil Industry

Beyond Ukraine’s direct kinetic attacks, international sanctions continue to target Russian energy revenue, hampering an already stretched Russian economy and its ability to fund the war in Ukraine.

The European Union imposed bans on short-term contracts for Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG), forcing Moscow to seek alternative Asian markets and secure new transport fleets.

The measures prohibit spot-market imports, ban the use of EU terminals for transshipping and re-exporting Russian LNG to non-EU countries, and phase out the remaining long-term supply contracts by January 2027.

Ukrainian Drone and Missile Strikes Are Destroying The Economy

Ukrainian drone strikes have increasingly hit deep inside Russia, and the Institute for the Study of War reported that in addition to attacks on the oil industry, Russian authorities are being forced to restrict the use of airspace in the Moscow air zone.

The Russian Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA) claimed on May 25 that Russian authorities will begin prohibiting civilian flights in the Moscow air zone at altitudes from 0 to 5,100 meters starting on June 1.

Russian authorities closed the Kaliningrad airport for a few hours due to a reported drone threat for the first time on May 25. That is significant, as the airport’s location, over 800 kilometers from Ukrainian-controlled territory and bordered by NATO states, underscores the growing reach of Ukraine’s drones.

One drone strike targeting a navigation service in Rostov-on-Don resulted in the suspension of air service at 13 major Russian airports.

“Middle Strike” Drones Have Hammered Targets Deep In Russia

The Ukrainian drone attacks are savaging Russia’s air defense networks. According to United24, drones destroyed more than 250 air defense units in April; in March and February, the figures were similar—up to 300 units each month.

The destruction of Moscow’s air defenses is the basis of Ukraine’s Middle Strike Drone strategy and allows it to hit targets deeper inside Russia.

These Middle Strike attacks are less expensive than traditional missile systems and can be manufactured in greater numbers. The attacks are scalable and enable daily strikes against targets that sustain the Russian military.

And they enable deeper-strike operations, especially when Russian air defenses are neutralized.

The “Middle Strike” refers to the range between battlefield first-person-view (FPV) tactical drones and the long-range deep-strike missile systems.

These fixed-wing drones have eviscerated Moscow’s air defenses, allowing for deeper and more successful strikes against Russian infrastructure. This includes weapons and ammunition depots, warehouses, and command posts.

The ISW reported that since early May, Ukrainian “intensified intermediate-range strikes” (Middle Strike Drone attacks) have targeted Russian logistics at operational depths ahead of a planned Ukrainian maneuver.

Ukrainian forces notably began in May 2026 to interdict key Russian ground lines of communication (GLOCs) in occupied Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson oblasts. They have also limited Russia’s use of many of the main resupply routes it relies on.

These attacks have basically isolated the entire Crimean peninsula, as Moscow is wary of sending equipment, large troop concentrations, and ships to the ports there, lest they be attacked with virtual impunity.

Middle-strike drone strikes aren’t limited to Crimea. In mid-May, Ukraine sent more than 600 drones on an attack on Moscow itself. The targets struck by the Ukrainian drones included the Moscow Oil Refinery, the Solnechnogorskaya fuel-loading station, the Volodarskaya petroleum-product pumping station, and the Angstrem microelectronics plant in Zelenograd, outside Moscow.

Russia Is Powerless To Stop These Attacks

Russia, thus far, has been powerless to stop the Ukrainian drone attacks. If anything, they are only growing in size and effectiveness.

The campaign has been bolstered by tech-forward adaptations, such as the Hornet drone, which utilizes AI-assisted targeting and Starlink communications to maintain fire control over occupied territories.

These strikes have had a profound psychological effect on civilians. Deep strikes inside Russia are increasingly common, forcing the Russian populace to confront a war they previously believed they were immune to.

It is showing the population that the rosy proclamations that their “special military operation” is progressing according to plan are total hogwash.

RUSSIA CHEATS INDIA TO BUY FOR $1 AN OLD AIRCRAFT CARRIER, THEN FORCES $2 BILLION IN REPAIRS!, LOL

India’s Big Naval Nightmare: Buying An Old Aircraft Carrier from Russia

Kiev-Class Aircraft Carrier Rebuilt and Serving in India’s Navy.

India has always executed an unorthodox military strategy. It is equipped with nuclear weapons but depends heavily on conventional forces to thwart its arch-enemy, Pakistan. It was non-aligned during the Cold War and still maintains its flinty independence. India is also known for purchasing significant numbers of arms systems from Russia.

For example, it has around 2,500 T-72 tanks. One purchase it would probably like to reconsider would be the acquisition of an aircraft carrier from Moscow that has been a big disappointment over the years.

The India and Russia Aircraft Carrier Story Is Painful

The INS Vikramaditya is a cautionary tale in the Indian Navy. The Indians wanted their own aircraft carrier in the early 2000s and looked to Russia for help.

However, the resulting ship has been afflicted with schedule slips and cost overruns. The saga has been a trail of tears for the Indian Navy.

This story started in 1988 when the Soviet Union built the Kiev-class vessel named the Baku. This was an interesting hybrid ship. The front of the ship reminded one of a heavy cruiser with anti-ship missile launchers and two deck guns. The rest of the vessel was a helicopter carrier.

So far, so good.

Admiral Gorshkov Was a Cursed Bucket of Bolts

Then the Soviet Union disintegrated in 1991. The struggling Russian navy did not have much funding or the desire to feature the old Soviet navy flagships.

Baku was renamed the Admiral Gorshkov. It remained a part of the Russian maritime force until 1996 when the trouble started. Since the Russian maintainers were not careful there was an explosion in the boiler room. This was the beginning of the carrier’s heartache, and the Russians decided to retire it.

Meanwhile, the Indian navy had a problematic choice later that decade. They were also going to retire their only carrier, the INS Viraat. This ship was going to be removed from active duty in 2007, and it would leave a big hole in the navy and keep the Indians from projecting power in their neighborhood.

India Was in the Market for a New Aircraft Carrier

India looked around and there were just not any carriers available that the country could afford and the only bargain that it could find was in Russia.

By 2004, the Indians were ready to finance a deal with Moscow. The government in New Delhi agreed that year to spend a whopping $974 million on the clunky Admiral Gorshkov.

But since it was under a billion dollars, the Indians thought they made a prudent purchase and had a potential hit on their hands. They should have known better.

The biggest problem was that the Gorshkov had been inactive all those years. As I explained above, the Russian Navy is not known for its maintenance prowess.

This artifact was going to need some love and attention.

India Was a Demanding Customer

India wanted an entire aircraft carrier, not just a hybrid aircraft carrier-cruiser. That meant a large flight deck supporting jet fighters – not just helicopters. Twenty-four MiG-29K fighters and 10 Kamov helicopters would be on board.

Russia also promised to supply new radars, arresting gear, and improved elevators. India re-named the refurbished carrier Vikramaditya after an old-world term for regality.

The Old Russia Bait and Switch Ploy

But once again, the Russians failed.

The work wasn’t complete by 2007, and Moscow wanted more funds to finish to the tune of $2.9 billion. Sea trials were going to cost $550 million.

It became clear that the Russians wanted to bleed the Indians dry. By 2008, employees were only halfway done with the refurbishment. The Russian defense contractor had never worked on a carrier before, and it showed.

India was in for a penny and in for a pound. It had already spent the first billion dollars, and it was too late to give up and extricate from the deal.

The Russians stopped working on the carrier for another two years until India coughed more money. New Dehli agreed to pony up another billion dollars to sweeten the pot. It took an additional three years, but the carrier was finally delivered to conduct sea trials in 2012 and then commissioned in 2013.

Then, more difficulties ensued. Spare parts were hard to come by. The boilers were thought to have been newly replaced, but they were faulty and kept the propulsion system from working correctly. The boilers broke down at least once.

The carrier had no air defenses, so the Indians tried to retrofit some anti-aircraft systems. Other updates require the Vikramaditya to be in drydock again, which could take another three years.

The Indians had to learn how to purchase aircraft carriers from the Russians. This is likely a valuable lesson taught at Indian naval academies and command and general staff schools. The Indians may have been able to build at least a helicopter carrier on their own, but they were blinded by ambition and wanted the full deal. They will likely never depend on the Russians again for such a big purchase.

POPE LEO COMPARES AI TO THE TOWER OF BABEL…? HOW ABOUT CRITICIZING THE MURDER OF CHRISTIANS THROUGHOUT THE WORLD, AND THE 7,000 PERVERT PRIESTS INSTEAD ?

Pope Leo Compares AI Threat to Biblical ‘Tower of Babel’

The head of the Catholic Church is adding his moral suasion to a growing backlash against the impact of artificial intelligence

Pope Leo XIV presenting his encyclical letter "Magnifica Humanitas" to an audience in the Vatican.

Pope Leo at the presentation of his first encyclical letter ‘Magnifica Humanitas’ on Monday in the Vatican, Italy. Gomez/Vatican Pool/Spaziani/dpa/ZUMA Press

VATICAN CITY—Pope Leo XIV warned that artificial intelligence “threatens to normalize an anti-human vision” and said that the concentration of immense digital power in the hands of a few private actors must be countered.

The pontiff’s encyclical letter—a text that is poised to define Leo’s papacy—reads like a sharp warning to Silicon Valley executives and humanity more broadly about the future of civilization as new technologies rapidly advance.

The risk, he said, is that humans will be reduced “to mere cogs in a system driven toward ever greater efficiency.”

Leo used two biblical images to describe the choice humanity faces.

“The primary choice is not between a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to technology, but rather between constructing Babel or rebuilding Jerusalem,” he wrote.

In the Bible, the Tower of Babel symbolizes a top-down, grandiose project where decisions are driven by pride, profit and a push for homogenization, the pope suggested in his text. In the rebuilding of Jerusalem, diverse people worked together to rebuild the ruined walls and established a fraternal coexistence within them, he added.

Leo’s encyclical has been long-awaited by policymakers, business leaders and different faith groups who see the Catholic Church, the largest Christian denomination, as a source of ethical guidance on tech policy.

In so doing, the pontiff is specifically calling out the private actors who are building the AI systems that will transform society.

“Leo sees the challenge of AI as a choice about its design, and about who gets to make those choices,” said Vincent Miller, a professor of theology at the University of Dayton, Ohio.

Pope Leo XIV signing his Encyclical Letter "Magnifica Humanitas".

The pontiff signed the encyclical letter earlier this month. VATICAN MEDIA/AFP/Getty Images

The encyclical is inspired by the church’s thinking about what it means to be human, and draws on 2,000 years of moral and social teachings.

It is also the product of a decadelong dialogue between the Vatican and Silicon Valley on the ethical and social challenges posed by AI.

Conversations with scientists, political leaders and teachers led Leo to a disturbing conviction, the pontiff said Monday.

“Artificial intelligence needs to be disarmed, freed from the logic that turned it into an instrument of domination, exclusion and death,” he said. “It must be at the service of all, and of the common good.”

At the presentation of the encyclical, Leo was accompanied by Christopher Olah, a co-founder and safety researcher at AI firm Anthropic, which has tried to position itself as a proponent of AI safety. It is a central player in the AI landscape, showing rapid growth in its business and emerging as a flashpoint on questions of AI safety and national security.

Anthropic has leaned in to philosophical questions such as whether AI models experience consciousness. The company employs an in-house philosopher to help instill morality in its AI.

The planned inclusion of Olah drew criticism for appearing to give Anthropic the Vatican’s stamp of moral approval. Vatican officials said Olah’s participation wasn’t intended as an endorsement, but as a gesture aimed at encouraging dialogue with the industry as a whole.

Olah said that AI companies—Anthropic included—have incentives that go against doing the right thing: commercial pressure, competition, pride and ambition.

“We will always be influenced by those incentives,” Olah said. That is why it is “enormously important that there be people outside those incentives,” such as church leaders, who insist on safety and “who are willing to be our earnest, thoughtful critics.”

Meeting the pope has become a rite of passage for a new generation of tech leaders, including Anthropic’s Dario Amodei, Cohere’s Aidan Gomez and top officials from OpenAI. Demis Hassabis, head of Google DeepMind, the search giant’s AI arm, was in 2024 named by the Vatican to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences.

Leo is adding his moral suasion to a growing backlash against the impact of AI.

In the U.S. and overseas, workers are concerned about job losses. College graduates are booing commencement speakers who evoke AI. Residents are protesting energy-hungry data centers. A man threw a Molotov cocktail at the house of OpenAI’s Sam Altman.

That the criticism comes from the first American pope is a rebuke for a technological revolution incubated in the U.S. and supported by President Trump, who has lashed out at the pontiff for criticizing the war in Iran.

Leo’s emphasis on threats to individuals’ human dignity and opposition to autonomous weapons casts him in contrast to techno-optimists who argue that AI will usher in a productivity revolution and that the U.S. must deploy its advances militarily before rivals such as China do.

A person holds up Pope Leo XIV's Encyclical Letter "Magnifica Humanitas" focusing on artificial intelligence in the Vatican.

The encyclical is inspired by the church’s thinking about what it means to be human. Alberto Pizzoli/AFP/Getty Images

AI-driven weapons systems, he wrote, risk lowering the moral threshold for the use of force, and make “war more ‘feasible’ and less subject to human control.”

Last week, Trump delayed an executive order that would have created a voluntary process for testing AI models.

Leo, in the encyclical, said there is an urgent need to regulate AI. “It is not enough to invoke ethics in the abstract; robust legal frameworks, independent oversight, informed users and a political system that does not abdicate its responsibility are required,” he wrote.

Leo has made AI a signature issue of his pontificate. INSTEAD OF CLEANING UP THE PEDO RIDDEN RANKS OF HIS PRIESTS WORLDWIDE.

Days after his election in May 2025, he told red-capped cardinals gathered in the Vatican that he chose his papal name as a homage to Leo XIII, the 19th century pope who stood up for workers against the industrial tycoons of his era.

Artificial intelligence, Leo said at the time, represented the industrial revolution of the modern age, and posed “challenges to human dignity, justice and labor.”

Titled “Magnifica Humanitas,” Monday’s encyclical was explicitly inspired by Leo XIII’s groundbreaking 1891 encyclical, “Rerum Novarum,” Latin for “of new things.” Both were signed on May 15.

“Rerum Novarum”—which backed calls for safe working conditions and against the concentrations of wealth—laid the foundation of Catholic social teaching, helping shape the politics and welfare systems of modern Europe. It also set the stage for the church’s ambivalent relationship to capitalism.

The pontiff called the prospect of mass unemployment caused by digital innovations “a true social calamity.” He added: “Technology is never neutral, because it takes on the characteristics of those who devise, finance, regulate and use it.”

Leo condemned servitude created by the technological revolution, including laborers in rare-earth mines, underpaid data center workers and young people exploited by online criminal networks.

At the same time, he used the moment to apologize for the Holy See’s role in legitimizing the enslavement of non-Christians until it unequivocally condemned slavery in the 19th century.

“This constitutes a wound in Christian memory, one from which we cannot consider ourselves detached,” the pope said. “In the name of the Church, I sincerely ask for pardon.”

Tech industry watchers say the pope has the power to lead a cultural change in how we think about AI—and shape the ethical framework in which it should evolve.

“The pope,” said Glen Weyl, a faith-and-technology researcher, “is perhaps the single most important person in the world on AI at this moment.”

he forget to say that this POPE has done nothing to support Christians who are being killed daily worldwide, and is pushing open borders everywhere…Looking forward to the AI pope as soon as possible.

TRUMP GOLDEN PHONE IS A FLOP…?

The $500 device has received a gag-inducing comparison.

The long-delayed golden Trump Mobile phone looks nothing like the advertised image, has a smaller screen than promised, and its color leaves a lot to be desired, according to one of the few people to lay eyes on a real one.

The $500 Trump phone has now been delivered to tech media for review, one year after it was announced and nine months after its hard launch to cash-rich MAGA diehards.

Not only is the screen smaller than expected, but the phone is also not made in America as promised, Patrick Holland, the managing editor of tech site CNET, told CNN. Rather, Holland added, the packaging says the phone is “designed with American values in mind.”

Patrick Holland discusses the Trump Phone on CNN. screen grab

Holland reviewed the phone on CNN on Monday after spending the day testing it, and the news was not good for customers.

Holland says the actual product looks “nothing like the original image” from last year, which he said resembled an “altered iPhone 16 Pro.”

Trump Mobile Phone Is Finally Released—With a Major Blunder MADE IN CONFUSION

Martha McHardy

The tech expert ripped into the phone’s selling point, criticizing the “gold” coloring in honor of Trump’s favorite thing.

“Sometimes it looks like those gold coins that Scrooge McDuck would jump into for DuckTales,” Holland said of the Disney character bathing in his riches.

Donald Duck reluctantly takes his nephews Huey, Dewey and Louie to the home of their reclusive great-uncle Scrooge McDuck. — Scrooge McDuck on a phone, not a Trump Phone. Disney XD/Disney XD via Getty Images

“Other times, it’s got a mustard vibe to it, and yet other times, it kind of looks like a urine sample.”

The CNET unboxing video also reveals that the American flag etched into the phone has 11 stripes, instead of 13. It comes with an old-school headphone jack and has Truth Social pre-installed. The camera also automatically filters selfies.

Holland said he would not recommend the phone to customers due to the unknown technical construction of the $500 item.

“We don‘t know what the processor is in the phone. We don‘t know what the software and security updates will be,” Holland said

He also said he has a “big worry” about whether the Trump Phone will actually ship to people who paid for it.

“While a couple of us in the media do have it, I can‘t find many cases of actual customers who put their money down to order the phone with the phone.”

President Donald Trump is regularly seen with his phone and frequently posts on his platform, Truth Social.

154 WOMEN BILLIONAIRES IN THE USA…

Clockwise from top right: MacKenzie Scott, Melinda French Gates, Taylor Swift, Alice Walton, Rihanna and Kim Kardashian© Paul Ryding

Taylor Swift. The president of In-N-Out Burger. The great-granddaughters of agriculture entrepreneur William Wallace Cargill.

These are some of America’s 154 female billionaires. Though they are far fewer in number than the country’s 981 male billionaires, these women have roughly the same size median net worth as the men do at just over $2 billion, according to data from Altrata, a wealth-intelligence firm.

There has been a striking jump in the number of women who are self-made, meaning they got at least some of their wealth from a significant enterprise they launched on their own. Far more women—about 60%—were at least partially self-made in 2024, compared with five years earlier, when only about 40% fell into that category. The rest owe their wealth to inheritance. Nearly all male billionaires are at least partially self-made.

The richest Americans control a historically large share of wealth today. The number of billionaires in the U.S.—male and female—keeps growing, and many of them are getting wealthier.

Altrata evaluates public and private data to determine wealth, and evaluates the wives and daughters of living male billionaires individually. These wealth figures are based on estimates of assets that they hold in their own names—whether or not that was derived from family wealth or business. Altrata looked at where an individual’s primary business is located.

For example, Susan Dell, the wife of Michael Dell, is worth $5.8 billion, in part because she owns millions of shares of Dell Technologies in a trust. But Lauren Sánchez Bezos, wife of billionaire Jeff Bezos, doesn’t appear on the list because available data doesn’t show that she has large investments like an ownership stake in Amazon.com.

The Journal analyzed Altrata’s data for a look at some of America’s wealthiest women, where their money comes from, and how they spend it. The data is from between 2024 and early 2026.

Many of the women at the top of the billionaires list inherited their wealth from fortunes that their parents or grandparents built. The women in this category often keep a low public profile. Alice Walton, daughter of Walmart founder Sam Walton, is the richest woman in the country with a net worth of $138 billion. (Each of her two living brothers has a similar net worth).

Some of these women are actively involved in the companies that are responsible for their vast wealth. Helen Johnson-Leipold, an heir to the S.C. Johnson fortune, runs publicly traded Johnson Outdoors, so her wealth is considered a combination of inheritance and self-made. A number of the Mars heiresses have held top roles at the candy and pet-food company.

Some built careers outside their family empires. Ronda Stryker, whose grandfather founded the medical-device company that shares her last name, worked as a special-education teacher for years. Oil magnate H.L. Hunt’s daughter June Hunt has hosted a Christian call-in radio show for decades.

Others started firms that are giants in their sectors. Judy Faulkner started privately held healthcare software company Epic Systems, where the company’s internal “10 commandments” include “do not go public.” Diane Hendricks co-founded roofing firm ABC Supply with her late husband Ken Hendricks.

Some operate major companies that prior generations of their families started, making their wealth part inheritance and part self-made. Abigail Johnson runs financial firm Fidelity Investments, founded by her grandfather. Lynsi Snyder is president of In-N-Out Burger, the fast-food chain her grandparents started in the 1940s.

Some of the most philanthropic billionaires are the ex-wives and widows of famous male billionaires. Melinda French Gates, who used to be married to Bill Gates, has given away at least $31 billion over the past decade. French Gates’s philanthropy is now focused on women’s rights and young people.

Jeff Bezos’s ex-wife, MacKenzie Scott, has given away billions to causes from higher education to Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, often with no strings attached.

Casino magnate Sheldon Adelson’s widow Miriam Adelson has given at least $961 million to philanthropic causes, including many Jewish and pro-Israel organizations. She’s also a major political donor, backing Republicans including President Trump.

Altrata tracked public donations over the past decade. The analysis doesn’t include all donations from foundations or contributions from donor-advised funds. It doesn’t include donations below $1,000.

Celebrities including Kim Kardashian, Rihanna and Taylor Swift make up a handful of the self-made women billionaires, though they tend to clock in on the lower end of the billionaire scale. (Altrata notes that billionaires globally who are worth less than $2 billion have a roughly 10% chance of losing their billionaire status in a given year based on fluctuations in the value of their investments and other assets).

Some of them have amassed wealth by starting successful companies after reaching celebrity status. The bulk of Rihanna’s $1 billion net worth comes from her stakes in Fenty Beauty, estimated at $690 million, and her lingerie brand, estimated at $300 million, according to Altrata. Properties in Los Angeles and her native Barbados are worth at least a combined $43.5 million.

Taylor Swift’s $1.8 billion net worth include earnings from her monster Eras tour, which helped bring her estimated cash and other assets to $1.7 billion, according to Altrata.